


Visual Stimulus

by servantofclio



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Shower Sex, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-28
Updated: 2012-06-28
Packaged: 2017-11-08 17:57:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/445912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/servantofclio/pseuds/servantofclio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shepard discovers why Garrus doesn't take his visor off, even in bed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Visual Stimulus

Garrus was sound asleep, sprawled adorably among the pillows and blankets, but Shepard was restless. She found herself watching him sleep, how sometimes his mandibles twitched even while he was unconscious. She only really noticed he was still wearing his visor when he rolled enough that it became askew. She smiled to herself. He left the thing on most of the time, so much that she sometimes forgot it wasn’t part of his face. Probably he did, too. Its current position didn’t look comfortable, though. She reached out and lifted it off, carefully, not wanting to wake him. She went still when he sighed and turned his head, but he settled, clearly still sleep.

She was thoroughly awake, and this was far too good an opportunity to be missed. She’d been especially intrigued with the thing since she found its specs in the old Shadow Broker’s files. She slipped out of the bed, tossed on a robe, and carried the visor with her over to her to her office area.

It was easy enough to power on, and a little experimentation brought up its various functions. The controls were labeled in turian script, so she was glad she’d spent some of her boring six months under house arrest learning to read turian. It wouldn’t fit her head, either, so she held it in front of her eyes and pointed it in his direction. She didn’t read quite enough turian, though, to easily interpret all the biometric data, lots of little numbers scrolling up the screen. She found the zoom function and amused herself by zooming in and out.

She brought up the music library and smirked to herself. Same eclectic but dubious taste in music, lots of electronic stuff and cheesy pop music and some turian band that sounded weirdly like old Earth death metal. Anything with a strong beat, it seemed like. Lately he’d mostly been playing “Die for the Cause,” maybe for extra motivation. 

What else did he have on this thing? Weapons specs and manuals. Maps. A Video menu—now, what was on that?

Most of the folders were labeled neatly: combat recordings, a few favorite vids. One had a code number instead of a label. Inside, the files were also identified only by random strings of characters. On a whim, she selected the file at the top of the list, and hit “Playback.”

What came up was an image of her own face. Her jaw dropped as she watched herself, smiling into the camera, then her eyes closing, the image growing blurry as the camera moved closer, toward her ear and neck. This... this was recorded just a few hours ago, when they’d come back from a mission with some pent-up energy, and had hardly made it into her quarters before Garrus had her backed up against the aquarium. For a moment, she was pissed off that he’d recorded this without telling her, but her irritation quickly washed away. She trusted Garrus. He wasn’t going to post this to the extranet or anything.

...besides, the whole thing was... kind of hot. Watching herself, watching his hands strip off her uniform, remembering how she’d felt, left her feeling flushed, getting worked up all over again. She stopped the recording and scrolled down through the list, picking a couple files at random. Playing a few second of each verified that they were all similar. On a hunch, she selected the file at the bottom of the list. 

Yes. This was their first time together, the recording starting just as he ran one hand down her arm. That one she watched for a while, with the sound turned off, remembering how nervous they’d been, how tentatively they’d explored each other. She watched and remembered the first time she’d felt the shocking pleasure of his hide against hers, how well, in the end they’d fit together. 

What had made him decide to record that? Something to remember, maybe, in case she didn’t come back from the Collector Base? She was tempted to go wake him up and make him do something about her current state of tension, but... maybe she’d leave him a little surprise instead. 

#

It was nice that the Primarch valued his opinion, but Garrus really could have done without the meetings. The only thing worse than paperwork. He sat politely in the midst of a dozen or more advisors while Victus and Sparatus debated the allocation of resources among the turian colonies. Garrus wondered if anyone would notice if he just walked out. To keep himself from nodding off, he quietly fired up “Die for the Cause.” A little patriotic reminder couldn’t hurt...

“Hey there, Vakarian. I set this to play the next time you accessed your audio files.”

Shepard’s voice. A little chill went down his spine. What the hell had she been doing to his visor?

“Come on, you know me well enough. Did you really think I was never going to hack this thing?”

Uh-oh.

“I found your little video collection, you know.”

_Oh, crap._

“And... I don’t think I mind, but you had better have that stuff secure, because if any of it winds up anywhere other than your personal collection, I am going to shred your fringe myself. Slowly. With a dull knife.”

Garrus swallowed and made a mental note to put more encryption on the video folder.

“But really, it was kind of hot to watch some of that. I notice you’ve replayed some of those several times, too. Don’t you think it lacks the full sensory experience, though? I thought I should tell you what it feels like from my end. In the first place, you taste amazing. Mordin’s vids totally didn’t tell me that. _Sweet_ , and a little metallic, and...”

“Vakarian?”

Garrus blinked and jerked his attention back to the meeting. Victus was frowning at him. “Yes, Primarch?” Fuck. He couldn’t turn the audio off. He tried to concentrate on the question that Victus repeated for him, with thinly veiled impatience, and not on Shepard’s voice, growing bright and enthusiastic about aspects of himself he’d never even thought about. He managed some kind of answer and promptly forgot what he’d just said.

“... and you feel so good, I mean, I’m sure I’ve told you that, but damn. Nothing else has ever compared to how you fill me. I see you’ve been accessing those files over the last six months. I’m a little jealous. I just had to make do with _fantasies_.”

_Spirits_. Garrus tried, desperately, to keep half an ear on the conversation, so he wouldn’t be caught out again. 

“And the Alliance wouldn’t even let me have any sex toys, did I tell you that? No unauthorized deliveries. Cruel and unusual punishment, I say. So all I could use was my hands. And that was fine, but not like your hands, so strong, and a little rough…”

The meeting broke up, and far too many people were suddenly trying to get Garrus’s attention, asking him for an update, or to pass on a message to Shepard, or… he didn’t even remember what he said to most of them. Told them to send him messages so he had a record. He certainly wouldn’t recall what their instructions actually were at this point, not with Shepard’s voice in his ear describing in _agonizing detail_ how she’d pleasured herself. 

He finally freed himself from the Primarch’s entourage. 

“Oh, and I made you a little video myself. I hope you enjoy it. Commence playback.”

Shit. He stumbled and almost crashed into someone as the video came up. Shepard faced the camera and stepped back. Into the shower. She must have set the visor on the sink. She smiled into the camera. “This was one of my favorites, in lockdown. At least I had a private bathroom. We’ve never done it in the shower, have we? We should definitely try that sometime.” She turned on the water, closed her eyes, deliberately ran soapy hands over her breasts and belly, fingers sliding between her thighs…

He asked EDI to confirm that Shepard was on the Normandy and headed for the docks, moving as fast as he could through the crowds on the Citadel.

#

EDI notified Shepard that Garrus had boarded the ship and was on his way to her cabin. She settled into her desk chair and pretended to work, but couldn’t stop herself from smirking at him when he came through the door, breathing hard. “Got something on your mind?”

“How about a shower?”

She grinned. “Can it wait for a bit? I’m in the middle of—”

He stalked toward her and leaned forward, bracing his hands on the arms of the chair, hemming her in. 

“No, it can’t. Tease.”

She dropped her datapad and nudged her forehead against his. “Voyeur.”

He laughed. “Is it really voyeurism if you’re watching your own...”

“I just said so, didn’t I?”

His tongue along her jaw line and neck distracted her from anything further. She sighed in appreciation and looped her arms around his neck. His hands were already busy with her clothes, so she started working on his armor. “You might help me out here,” she noted, once he’d gotten her naked, while she was still figuring out the seals and catches of his new armor. 

“I’m having fun here,” he rumbled against her shoulder, running his hands over her. 

“Yes, but...” She gasped as the alternation of nips and licks hit a particularly sensitive spot. “... you’re not going to get what you’re after until this is off.”

“Good point.” He stepped back and carefully, deliberately, holding her gaze, took the visor off. 

Shepard laughed. “Not going in the collection, hm?”

“I don’t think water will be good for it,” he said, stripping himself much more efficiently than she’d managed.

She only had a moment to appreciate how very ready for her he was before he scooped her up and she had to hold on to his shoulders for balance. Just a couple of steps into the shower, and he hit the controls with his elbow, soaking them both in wonderfully hot water. She’d thought it would be fast and hard, but no, apparently he wanted to take his time. He set her on her feet and turned her around to soap her up. She closed her eyes and took in the sensations: hot water running over her skin, the scent of soap, his rough hands, slick with soap, covering her and teasing her breasts until she whimpered. He delved down between her thighs, stroking first gently, then firmly, until her climax shuddered through her and she cried out. His other arm circled around her waist, supporting her as she leaned back against him. 

“Better than fantasies?” he inquired.

Cocky bastard, he knew what the answer was. “Mm,” she managed. She found her feet and turned around, taking in the sight of him glistening in the spray, water streaming down. She leaned in to kiss his mouth and jaw and neck, see how the water tasted running off him. He lifted her up and braced her against the wall. Cool smooth tile in front of her, warm rough turian in front of her. She wrapped her legs around his waist and he slid into her just like she’d been imagining, all those lonely showers.

After, they toweled off and made it to the bed, collapsing, entwined. “Sorry about the vids,” he said. “I should have asked.”

“Yeah, but...” she made a one-shouldered shrug, too comfortable to move any more. “I don’t mind. I trust you. Why did you, though?”

“The first time I wasn’t sure we were coming back. After that... mostly a bad habit, I suppose. It just reminded me that everything was real.”

“Very real.” She pulled him closer. “And much better than fantasies.”


End file.
